Tales from the Border Sea
by Otter Seastar
Summary: Backstories, and a rewritten future, for Drowned Lady Wednesday and those who serve her.
1. Healing

**My mind is in the Border Sea and my allegiance belongs to the Lady Leviathan, but they in turn are owned by Garth Nix.**

**I begin with the canonically-heartbreaking penultimate scene in ****Drowned Wednesday,**** where Arthur faces her beside Suzy, Leaf, and the Carp…**

* * *

><p><span>Healing<span>

"Be as you were," Arthur commanded, pointing the Third Key at Lady Wednesday. "When you were never hungry, when the Architect was still here."

Her limbs slimmed again, but she didn't uncurl. "Poisoned…by Nothing…"

"BE HEALED IN BODY AND MIND!" The trident heated and trembled violently in his hands, but he held it firm, envisioning the ruptured worldlet in her stomach vanishing into the Void without a trace. "Be purged of Nothing, of hunger, of everything!"

The tiny _Rattus Balaena_ fell from her mouth. With the Key, he directed it to one side before it became full-sized, and kept it afloat as the Rats and an exhausted Doctor Scamandros launched and scrambled onto an inflated raft. Then it crumbled to Nothing and was banished.

When he turned back to Wednesday, she was on her feet and smiling. "I'm healed, Lord Arthur. Of everything." She pirouetted, throwing her head back. "I'll never eat again!"

"I doubt that," someone said in the huge group of Denizens treading water a short distance away.

"_Return to me, my followers! You are no longer in danger!" _bellowed the Carp. A cacophony of splashes drew nearer in response.

A winged golden shark appeared on the horizon and arrived in a few leaps, circling above them like an excited puppy before transforming into a winged woman and swooping down to clasp her lady's hands.

"Your lonely days are over, my Dawn." Wednesday turned to Arthur. "I will need a new Noon and Dusk."

"I was thinking of a professional sailor called Sunscorch for—"

"NO!" two voices called in unison.

Two Followers of the Carp swam forward – a black-haired female Denizen and a blonde girl who had to be a Piper's child. Arthur lifted them, along with Leaf and Suzy, from the water to stand beside him. "Who are you, and what's your objection?"

The Denizen knelt, facing Wednesday. "I am Chiasa, former First Mate of the _Cuttlefish. _I have sailed in your service all my life, until Feverfew sank my ship and enslaved me in your inner worldlet. But I long to leave all land and ships, to roam across and within the Border Sea, and to work by your side tending is as best we can. I beg you to take me as your Noon."

The girl remained standing, then knelt when Chiasa poked her shin. "I'm Jennie Barnacle Scraper, former ship's boy on the _Cuttlefish. _I never served you before, 'cause I'd have just been serving _myself _to you as a snack, though I ended up in your stomach anyway, but I go where Chiasa goes and now I want to go under the sea and be your Dusk. "

"No Piper's child can be a Time," Wednesday said disdainfully. "An impossible job for you, and undignified for me. But you may be my Noon, Chiasa."

Arthur turned to Scamandros. "Doctor, would you like the job?"

"Dusk." A sun appeared on Scamandros's forehead and slid down to disappear below a sea-horizon by his left ear. A crescent moon rose from the sea by his right ear. "I would be honored, Lord Arthur."

"But—" Jennie protested.

"You could be a Tierce like me," Suzy suggested.

"What do you do?"

Suzy grinned. "Whatever I want, mostly."

"You would not do 'whatever you want' as _my_ Tierce," Wednesday said. "You would be my messenger throughout the Sea, House, and Secondary Realms, and help Noon in every way you can."

"Great! I get along with everyone." She leaned close to Arthur and whispered "Even the Raised Rats."

_Yes,_ Arthur thought. _The Rats are hated by Wednesday and her Dawn, but friendly with all Piper's children_. It would be good to have someone in power who valued them as allies and would have no wish to antagonize them. "What do the rest of you think?"

Chiasa smiled. "Jennie Barnacle is as tenacious as her name and as smart as a Denizen, and has always been curious about you, milady. She would serve you well."

"Then you may be my Tierce, Jennie," said Wednesday. "But if you prove more trouble than you're worth, I'll eat – no, feed you to her." She pointed at Dawn, who obligingly took winged-shark form for a moment and then became a woman again, still baring her teeth in a grin.

Chiasa sighed. "I wish I could do that,"

"You and Dusk can learn," said Dawn. "Teaching you would be my pleasure."

"Can I learn, too?" asked Jennie.

"No. But with the Key, you can be made able to breathe water as well as air. Lord Arthur, will you do so?"

Arthur hesitated. He'd done what was necessary, but was reluctant to inch farther toward becoming a Denizen. "I'm…afraid of sorcerous contamination…"

"Do this for my loyal follower," commanded the Carp.

Dawn frowned. "If you won't do this small bit of sorcery, how do you intend to restrain and rule the Border Sea?"

"I don't. I'm going home, after giving stewardship of the Key to—" He stopped. He'd been about to say "Dame Primus," but the team of five people around him knew and loved the sea far better, and he trusted one of them far more. "Scamandros. Are you willing?"

"I – of course, if you wish it."

"_You can't do that!_" screamed the Carp, its moustache-tendrils writhing.

"Your first part didn't want the job when given it." Ignoring its protests, he pressed the trident into Scamandros's hands, speaking the words which transferred his power. Everyone immediately sank, until Scamandros raised them again.

"Ships coming," said a Rat on the raft, peering through a small telescope. "Five of ours, and a strange one…with the Mariner aboard!"

"I hope they'll take us all to Port Wednesday," said Arthur. "Then the Carp can join Parts One and Two of the Will, and these three thousand Denizens can—"

"—start rebuilding," Scamandros finished. "Without a – well – with these changes, much of the land will no longer be submerged. Buildings converted to ships can perhaps be re-transformed, and their operation resumed; ships can be built for the lifelong sailors who've lost them. I will come to check the progress later, but will first secure the boundaries of the sea while my companions spread the word of our lady's return. Miss Jennie, I will now ensorcell you to breathe underwater and find for you the waterproof stick-on wings which I believe are somewhere in my coat. Then I must rest."

"So must I," said Wednesday. "I can't remember the last time I stopped eating for even an hour."

* * *

><p>Wednesday lay floating, eyes closed, savoring the sun's warmth on her face, the feel of her hair swirling gently around her, and the absence of hunger-pain in her belly. Her Times lounged on the <em>Balaena<em>'s raft a discrete distance away. Scamandros dozed, tattooed fish drifting across his face, as the others sat gazing out to sea. Everyone else had left.

Tears sparkled in Dawn's eyes. "It's so good to see her happy, free of the need to eat."

"That's silly," Jennie grumbled. "Eating is fun."

Dawn glanced sharply at her. "_Eating _may be fun. Incessant, insatiable _hunger_ is agony, especially when you spend millennia able only to feed it with slimy little fish and wriggling sea-bugs."

"Insatiable," Chiasa mused. "But now she can eat to satiation, and eat good food. I hope she'll enjoy doing so someday."

Dawn snorted. "Don't hold your breath."

"I won't need to hold my breath," Jennie declared. "Not ever again." She stood and dove into the sea.

Chiasa sprang up with a curse and looked down. The girl hovered several feet deep, chest moving as if she breathed. Soon she surfaced. "See?"

Chiasa hauled her out by the shirt, nearly capsizing the raft. "Don't scare me like that again!"

"Then don't _get _scared again, because I won't drown. I can live in the sea if I want, like those scaly people we saw in the Stomach."

"They're called Nisser, I told you. Wednesday's guards, who all were eaten."

"Not all of them," said Dawn. "Some were far enough away when she transformed, and have been living in the most barren parts of the sea, where she never went to feed. Now we must find them and take them back into her service."

"Wonderful!" Chiasa's eyes gleamed oddly for a moment. "I always liked them."

"Mind you, much more of the sea has since been made barren by our lady's feasting. We must tend the remaining populations of sea life fish and help them spread again. There's so much work to do…"

Chiasa put an arm around Dawn's shoulders as Jennie leaned against her other side. "Together we'll get it done."

* * *

><p><strong>Spoiler: In this rewrite, Dame Universe-Destroyer won't get her way, and both Wednesday and the House (including its Sea) will survive. I plan to write some backstories next, and am pondering further adventures for the dream team. Suggestions are welcome.<strong>

**I named Chiasa after the black swallower **_**Chiasmodon niger**_**, a deep-sea fish able to swallow animals four times its size, and Jennie after the insatiably gluttonous canine heroine of Maurice Sendak's lovely book, ****Higgledy Piggledy Pop!**

**I don't know if any Piper's children had followed the Carp, or if a Key can make someone (besides the wielder, as we saw in ****Superior Saturday****) breathe underwater, or if non-Trustee Denizens besides Wednesday's Dawn can learn to shapeshift. But as they say in the House, I don't give a Raised Rat's whisker. Apologies to the Rats.**


	2. Cuttlefish

**Here's a bit of backstory from Jennie's POV. I'm working on several chapters for various characters, and not all of them are this dialogue-centric, though there will be some internal (haha) monologues. **

Cuttlefish

I walk along the wharf of surprisingly-small Port Wednesday, toward a row of docked ships. Feathery clouds sprawl across the wide blue sky and birds fly squealing in circles above glittering waves. I also want to run in circles and scream with joy, but nobody would hire a child acting so, well, childish.

I've just been discharged from the Glorious Army of the Architect after serving my hundred years. Some things there were fun, like exploring the Great Maze's many little habitats and living with other Piper's children. But I didn't like wearing armor and weapons, fighting Nithlings, stupidly pointless rituals like shaving, constantly fearing a summons from deadly Sir Thursday, or – I've probably forgotten most of it, having been washed between the ears three months ago. But I wrote down my love of the Border Sea, and never forgot it, and now I'm returning there to stay.

The _Rattus Navis III_ is docked, its crew loading it for the next voyage. They wave and call greetings, which I return. I'd love to work on a Rat ship – they're friendly to Piper's children and don't literally or figuratively look down on us like Denizens – but they never need non-Rat sailors, so I move on.

At the row's end is a big, beautiful ship with a wavy rainbow band painted across each sail and "Cuttlefish" in curly blue letters on the prow. Approaching, I hear splashing on the far side – has someone fallen in? I race past it and look down a short, rocky slope at a Denizen-woman thrashing around in the water.

I scramble down to the water, calling "Are you all right?" Not that I can do much if she isn't.

"Of course!" She swims toward shore. "Just having a swim. You're welcome to join me."

"I really want to, but…" I don't want to get my clothes salty and slimy when I might not get the chance to wash them for a while, and am afraid to swim naked where there could be barnacles and sharp rocks. So I only bare my feet and sit to dip them in the warm sea, which swirls deliciously around them.

She emerges onto the rocks beside me, her shirt and breeches instantly turning clean and dry – lucky! "I'm Chiasa, first mate of the _Cuttlefish_. We're on leave after selling our cargo, and swimming is my idea of fun."

"I'm Jennie Barnacle Scraper, former ship's boy of the _I Forgot What Ship_ and future ship's boy of the _I Haven't Found It Yet_. What kind of fish is a cuttle?"

"Not a fish, but a small animal much like a squid. She's one of Lady Wednesday's original merchant ships, and still makes trading voyages to the Secondary Realms."

"Do you meet with Wednesday a lot, then?"

She looks puzzled. "Of course not, ever since…don't you know?"

I shake my head. "Been a hundred years in the army and a washing between the ears."

"And perhaps your former crew never told you; some don't like to speak of it. But…" she leans close to me and whispers, "Our lady is a whale now."

I can almost feel my eyes bulge. "_What?!_"

"She was a voracious eater who used the Third Key to stay Denizen-sized. Thousands of years ago, the other Trustees took most of its power from her, and she was transformed to fit her appetite."

"I would eat nonstop if it turned me into a whale!"

She laughs. "Don't try it."

"I won't get the chance. Ship's boys probably don't get fed _that _well, though I hope we don't get starved for a year like Army recruits."

"The _Cuttlefish_ has no ship's boy. Would you like to be ours?"

I hesitate. She's uncommonly nice, but I need to be careful when choosing the ship which I could literally live on forever.

She looks at my wave-washed feet. "I'll have self-cleaning clothes cut to fit you, though I'll take them away if you skip chores to swim."

That does it. I hand her my coat and plunge in, slithering over seaweedy rocks into sunlit depths, diving and splashing and flipping, backstroking to squirt a mouthful of water in the air. It tastes disgusting, but if I were a whale, I wouldn't mind. Eventually, I tire and swim back to her.

"Is that a 'yes'?" she asks, helping me onto the rocks.

"Aye, aye!"

"Wonderful! She's a good ship with a fine crew, and you'll be as safe as possible with us. But I warn you, the sea is dangerous nowadays. Pirates run rampant, though they mostly prey on lesser ships, and great eddies of Nothing leak in from the Void. Our lady is unable to control either of them, using the Key's remaining power only to keep herself from growing as big as the sea."

"How does she carry the Key if she's a whale?"

She frowns. "I never wondered that."

Denizens rarely wonder about anything, so I'm used to that answer. "So where are we going next?"

"To an ocean-covered world for the fruits of their underwater gardens, and a port in another world for jewels and spices. You'll get to see new sights and I'll make sure you get to eat new foods."

"Do you think we might spot Whaley-Wednesday somewhere?"

She grabs my shoulders. "Don't call her that!" she hisses, green eyes fierce.

"Why not?"

"It's considered very disrespectful. You Piper's children may have trouble with the concept of 'respect,' but you'll still get clouted on the ear by a sailor's powerful fist if the any of crew hear you say it. Many people call her 'Drowned Wednesday,' but we don't, as she's very much alive. Call her 'Lady Wednesday' or 'our lady.'"

Denizens are weird.

"No, I haven't seen her since she took to the water. Everyone stays well away from her, as she's one hundred and twenty-six miles long with a mouth ten miles wide, and still eats everything in her path."

"Wow, she's even more dangerous than Sir Thursday."

"She was always dangerous, and wild. But she used to be wise and good-natured as well, a glorious lady who loved to sail, swim, tend the sea…and eat, before hunger overpowered all else in her mind. Now she can _only_ swim and eat." A tear slides down her cheek. "She was my friend."

I take her hand. "_I'll_ be your friend now."

She wraps me in a sideways hug, which I return, her body shaking as if she's struggling not to sob aloud. Then she swings me up onto the wharf, tosses me my coat and shoes, and climbs up to join me, and together we walk toward the _Cuttlefish._

* * *

><p>I stand at the rail, gazing at a shining blue-white path of moonlight across night-blackened waves. Masts rattle softly behind me. Far away, a flying fish leaps and glides in a silver streak, submerging with a small splash.<p>

I've been aboard the _Cuttlefish_ for ten years, or maybe twenty; it's hard to tell. We crisscross the Border Sea to salvage the diseases enjoyed by Denizens bored enough with their eternal unchanging jobs to welcome _anything _new (I still think they're crazy) and visit the Secondary Realms to buy goods. I love seeing bits of other worlds – lakes and seas and skies and ships, port towns and shorelines, people and animals - though I'm rarely allowed to go far from the ship, and Chiasa buys me delicious local foods like seafood stews, strange sandwiches, fried vegetables, and blood oranges. Whenever we cross the Line of Storms, I clutch the rail and wriggle with glee in the chaos of light and sound. Chiasa tries to answer my questions about everything, and helped me to relearn the work of a ship's boy. We swim together whenever the ship is anchored in water which isn't too rough or cold.

Visiting Earth always makes me a little sad, though. At every port, I wonder – is _this _where I lived before the Piper took me to the House? Is this before or after my time, or could I meet someone who once knew me? All I remember of that before-life is a home near an ocean and a mother who loved me.

And doing this forever doesn't sound so great anymore. I feel like I've seen the whole Border Sea – but only its surface and shallows. I ache to see what's below: animals and habitats and lost things too big to float, whatever now lives in drowned Port Wednesday, and the whale herself. That blank blue sheet will never stop taunting me. I'd do anything for a trip on the _Rattus Balaena_!

Footsteps draw near. "What are you doing?" Chiasa asks, behind me.

I don't turn. "Looking for flying fish. And _not _flying sharks."

She sighs. "Jennie, please stop sulking and get some rest."

"That was Wednesday's Dawn! _Why didn't you let me talk to her?_" When that creature leaped from the waves, glittering gold in the morning light, I thought I'd never seen anything so marvelous. But then she became a winged woman, and the captain and Chiasa greeted her by name, and they all went into the chart room and slammed the door in my face.

"Because you would've pestered her her with questions. We had important business to conduct, and she has no time to spare. The well-being of the entire sea rests on her shoulders."

"Fins."

"Yes, fins. And wings."

"She travels under the sea and sees what lives there! She's the only one who's talked with Wednesday in ages! There's so much she must know…"

"Look, I always envied her too. And Noon and Dusk, before they were swallowed. But we all do what we were made for, in the House."

"I wasn't _made_ for doing anything." Swiping tears from my eyes, I stare at the setting moon. The silhouette of a distant ship moves across it, then the ship curves around and moves swiftly toward us. A ship with its colors backward – a pale hull and dark sails.

Fingers dig into my shoulder. I look back at Chiasa's hand and up into her face – paler than usual, teeth bared, eyes round and shining with moonlight.

"The _Shiver_," she says quietly.

* * *

><p><strong>I know it's strange to write about the canonical present in the past tense and the past in the present tense, but here it felt right. And <em>I<em> am strange.  
><strong>


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